let me steal this moment
by creatoriginsane
Summary: "The existence of celestial beings has always been debatable." A vignette collection. AU.


**let me steal this moment**

A/N: Revisions for _Cactus Flower _have remained the same as they have two months after I stopped writing it, a very barebones outline that doesn't go past Senryuu at eleven years old. I am no means abandoning that story, I've got a lot planned for it and I want to write a lot for it. Senryuu is one of my favorite characters to write (well, as far as the scenarios in my head tell me) and I don't want her and the other characters I've created for this world to waste away.

That being said, major revisions are up ahead, much larger than the "Senryuu first meets Mephisto as a dog" point. The angels, and subsequently Zion (formerly Pandora), will no longer exist in that universe. I've been going back and forth with my sister these past months regarding Zio and its role/purpose/goal in the varying arcs in the manga. Sad to say, the conclusion was that Zion cannot really exist unless there's a near-total overhaul/AU of the events of the manga.

And that would take me a LOT of time to plan, so here's the alternative. A series of vignettes and one-shots. The idea of Zion has potential, and I'm thinking of writing an original work for it. And given that Zion would no longer exist in the universe of _Cactus Flower_ and the "sequel" to that, which is _The Prophecy _(lol, now I gotta change that title), I have more room to explore characters and relationships.

Yeah. I'll end that there. Feedback is always appreciated. Thanks for reading.

* * *

"_The existence of celestial beings has always been debatable."_

_A vignette collection._

* * *

Demons.

Her mother never really spoke of them. All she has told her was that they are beings from the dark land of Gehenna. The mysterious realm of eternal night. The place of no life. The deep mirror of their own world. The Underworld, as it is more commonly called, but it is not. Nor is it Hell.

She was born the child of one of those demons.

"_S__he shall become a protector."_

But mother didn't call them so, not even while she was in her womb. They aren't demons, only otherworldly beings.

"_Zion opens its gates to her."_

Her mother is a kind, kind soul; born into a long lineage of spirit healers and working as a sort of apothecary, an herbalist, a doctor. Though strange and mystical her patients might be, she welcomes them all the same as she would human patients.

Her mother had even come to the aid of a Baal.

The King of Fire.

Her father.

"_No matter her lineage, her destiny is hers to claim."_

Ayako Yukimachi clutches the babe in her arms and hums a lullaby.

* * *

Demons.

That is what they taught him in the asylum. Dark beings, evil beings. They come from Gehenna, a pitch-black land of utter chaos. The realm beneath this one. The world lurking underneath Assiah. Sometimes they refer to it as the Underworld. Hell. But the dead aren't welcome there.

He was born into the world for them, specifically their kings.

"_The Lucifer group receives three new additions."_

They named him L-0083.

"_The mother didn't make it."_

The woman who gave birth to him was still young, still in the prime of her youth; coming from a line of spirit mediums from Eastern Europe. She was an exorcist, ranked fourth in her class, a Tamer. She had been given an opportunity to better her position, to better help the world, and she took it.

That was ten months ago.

Her ancestor was a nun who could have been canonized as a saint.

The woman hung a rosary around her wrist and recited verses every day.

Perhaps she could have been a saint, too.

"_She died in battle against a Leviathan."_

The doctor holds the baby in his arms while the nurse types his orders.

* * *

Special.

Her mother told her she was special, that seeing mystical beings is what separates her from the rest of the world. She grows up thinking that this special ability is normal, that these creatures pose no threat to them. And Kanazawa is full of them, full of creatures both celestial and otherworldly.

But her mother doesn't tell her that such creatures are beyond human understanding.

"_Those things don't exist! You're weird!"_

Senryuu first experienced rejection at six years old, late one afternoon at the school grounds, talking to the boy she liked.

A demon, however minor, had gotten through the barrier.

"I don't want to see them anymore."

Senryuu doesn't cry about the rejection, but gets angry all the same. And something like hot fire clenches around her heart. The emotion rattles her body as she screams and cries.

"Why am I like this, Mommy?"

She doesn't ask about her father, at least not yet.

* * *

Special.

The doctors told him he was special, like all the others, that they had a higher purpose in life compared to the rest of humankind. But he grows up believing in something else. The woman assigned to their group, their new mother, taught them something else. She taught them about beings called angels and gods.

But "Mother" didn't tell them that they were real.

"_They are holy creatures, and if you pray to them, your wishes will come true."_

L-0083 knew better than to pray to idols. He knew that certain demons could grant wishes, too.

Nonetheless, the way the woman described these creatures stayed on his mind.

"_They're great beings of light, shining like the sun."_

She presented them with images and called them "angels" and "saints." A golden ring of light was around their heads, and she called it a halo. She told them that they could have halos, too.

"Prepare the subjects for the test."

L-oo83 believed she was talking about their blond hair.

* * *

Mephisto Pheles is an enigmatic figure in her life.

Ayako introduces him as an uncle, her father's brother. She is seven years old when this happens, looking up at the stranger in their living room, clutching tightly to the chair she is standing behind.

"_Oh, so here is my darling niece!"_

He gives her things, a lot of things, things her mother would never give her on a whim, things she had only wished for, things she had only dreamed about. She wonders why this person suddenly appeared in her life, why he is full of promises and ambition. He told her he had a grand plan, a plan that can change the world, and he wanted her to be part of it.

"_I can even tell you about your father if you like."_

And so she follows him, expecting her mother to deny her this choice. But surprisingly, Ayako says no word against it. Instead, she gives a warning, simple and clear.

"Be careful of whom you trust, Senryuu. And always pray to the angels."

* * *

Mephisto Pheles is an unwanted figure in his life.

Their "mother" never spoke about him, and neither did any of the doctors and nurses prior to his ninth birthday. Though he could hardly call it a birthday, it wasn't like any of those celebrations described in those books. It was more like a ceremony.

"_A name. Think of it as my gift to you."_

There's a rush of excitement through his body. Most children here are only given names, but he is given the chance to choose. He thinks it's because he's at the top of his class, perhaps the best in their group. He must be special, so his name must be special. He pours over the books provided to him, reads through each and every one until he has found the perfect name.

"_That's quite an ambitious name, don't you think?"_

And Mephisto laughs, explains the hilarity of it, says this was all just a joke because he was bored. But before he could do anything, before he could say anything, Mephisto continues. And his words imbed themselves into the crevices of his mind.

"You want a name befitting that kind of ambition, then so be it, Arthur."

* * *

Angels.

That is what her mother called them. Celestial beings from up above, from the distant dreamland of Shamayim. The mysterious dominion beyond the clouds. The place where life began. The dwelling of gods and goddesses. Paradise, it is also often called. Heaven.

But she hasn't encountered any angel yet.

"_Why look for them? They're always absent."_

And Mephisto would chide her–his darling little niece–and tell her to put her story books away. Angels cannot possibly exist, not in Assiah. They've always been far, so far away from everything, so removed from this existence. They're all-powerful beings who have kept to themselves and will continue keeping to themselves until the end of time.

"_Always minding their own. Only their own."_

And she listens to him. She listens to him because she has to, she wouldn't be able to know anything otherwise. This being, figure, entity–this uncle of hers has given her everything she wanted and taught her everything she wanted to know, everything she needed to know. So if angels don't exist...

"_She will never hear of Zion. Not while I am here."_

...then they don't exist.

* * *

Angels.

The people around him don't really talk about them. Everything he knows, he's read in ancient texts, but they're never really discussed as much as demons are. Shamayim, the supposed dwelling place of such creatures, is nothing but a paragraph in their books, a mere footnote compared to the chapters and chapters on demons.

So maybe, he thinks, angels don't exist.

"_They're mysterious beings, and far more secretive than any demon."_

But he comes across a book one day, hidden behind a row of children's stories, about angels. Its cover is a bit worn, the gold letters faded into the leather, and the pages yellowed from time. He reads it, it's a picture book, surely one of the older books in the facility. It said angels were once people who ascended past mortality, people who were given a choice to become so much more than what they were initially meant to be.

"_Anyone can become an angel, even one such as you."_

He closes the book gently, as if he was hiding a secret, and puts it back, back behind the row of books. He thinks quietly to himself, his mind still quite muddled with the images and ideas presented by the book. One's deeds were the basis for one's ascension beyond mortality, if one's good deeds numbered greatly, they could become angels.

"_Angels are powerful beings able to rid evil creatures."_

Exorcists are kind of like angels, aren't they?

* * *

A/N: Explorations in both character-building and world-building.


End file.
